Posted
by
CmdrTaco
on Thursday April 21, 2011 @01:13PM
from the good-job-kids dept.

Itesh writes "Following an established trend, a Federal Trade Commission undercover shopper survey found that video game retailers continue to enforce most vigorously the ratings governing age and content that were established by the entertainment media industry. Music CD retailers lag far behind movie theaters, as well as movie DVD and video game retailers, in preventing unaccompanied children under age 17 from purchasing entertainment intended for mature audiences."

And yet all the politicians who think we need to enact all these stricter laws when it comes to video game sales will ignore this and try to claim that any 5 year old can walk into a game store and buy GTA IV on their own.

And yet all the politicians who think we need to enact all these stricter laws when it comes to video game sales will ignore this and try to claim that any 5 year old can walk into a game store and buy GTA IV on their own.

The industry should have let the politicians make laws, because those laws would almost certainly have been thrown out as unconstitutional. People would laugh at the idea of mandatory age-ratings on books, so why do they accept it on movies and games?

'Self-regulation' of this kind is bad precisely because it does work and can't be eliminated overnight through the courts.

It was a picture book? That's what people worry about, the imagery, rather than the text. If it has to come from your mind, the imagery is already there. If it comes from the movie, the movie can put it there.

Stephen King's books put at least as unpleasant thoughts into my head as any other medium (film/TV) which is why I read only one or two before deciding "no more" and still would rather that I hadn't read those. Mind you, I watch hardly any TV/film either as I find most intensely annoying.

I've had instances where I wish there were some sort of rating system for books. An example would be last summer when my 12 year old daughter asked me to get her a copy of a book called "Go ask alice". Sounded ok. Plot summary on the back seemed like no big deal.... it wasn't until someone else mentioned they were shocked I'd let her read it that I actually picked it up and realized I'd made a big mistake. In the end I spent a lot of time talking to her about the issues within since you can't put the sh

Seems to me your kid is smarter for having read that book. And when she is offered drugs (because she will be) she will have that novel to include in her decision making process. It could of maybe have waited another year perhaps two but you can never be sure when the first time your kid is offered drugs is going to be.

Plot summary on the back seemed like no big deal.... it wasn't until someone else mentioned they were shocked I'd let her read it that I actually picked it up and realized I'd made a big mistake. In the end I spent a lot of time talking to her about the issues within since you can't put the shit back in the horse.

I see no mistake here. Girl reads book with important issues and the parent discusses those issues with her. That's the way it's supposed to work, it's called good parenting and you have it here.

So to answer your question, I'd support voluntary ratings for books - but not mandatory ones.

There essentially are, or at least if you look at hardcover children's books, many of them do give an age range on the front book flap. Also, children's books tend to be separated into age categories in the actual book store. The only category that seems to not be differentiated (though I'm starting to see it) is the teen section, but I think that's also 'cause publishers tend to lump all teens (from 13 to 19) into the same broad category.

And that can be a big part of the problem with categorizing media this way. Should 'Black Hawk Down' and 'Saving Private Ryan' really be in the same category as the various Saw/Hostel/other Slasher fics?

Speaking of children's books, while they do generally give an age range, there are a number that cover topics that often get certain types of parents or 'interested adults' up in a snit.

So those parents should google the book they plan to give their child, or at the least skim it in the store, as the only books that come in plastic wrap are porn and manga (which has age ratings and a breakdown of the content/reason for the rating). Every parent I know who really cares about what their kid reads makes a deal with their child that the parent will read the book first and if it's ok, than the kid gets it (and yes, most of these people's kids bypass this censorship in one way or another-oh the

Realistically, the movie rating system is only voluntary if you plan to not make any money, or have anyone see your film. Yes, you can get yours hands on a film where the creator did not accept the review board's rating, but you usually have to seek it out, go find it. You won't see it appear in most mainstream theaters because the theaters simply don't accept them.

On a slightly related note, the review boards that rate movies make some absurd decisions.

And yet all the politicians who think we need to enact all these stricter laws when it comes to video game sales will ignore this and try to claim that any 5 year old can walk into a game store and buy GTA IV on their own.

Which is more expensive: buying a politician to kill the bill before it becomes a law or filing a lawsuit to have the law found unconstitutional after the bill has become a law?

The United States is a federal system, and these censorship laws are often made at the state level. Convincing an appellate judge to declare a statute unconstitutional in one state followed by what amount to routine filings for summary judgment in other states is likely cheaper than buying legislators in all 50 states.

People would laugh at the idea of mandatory age-ratings on books, so why do they accept it on movies and games?

I think that has one very simple reasons: Violence in books is text, not picture, thus much more abstract and less interesting for children.

And when it comes to picture books, well pornography is already regulated, try to sell that to minors and see how far you get with that. And with violent picture books, aka comics, there also have been quite a few outcries and tries to get it regulated.

So its not really that books are handled different because they are books, but because they actually are different and

People would laugh at the idea of mandatory age-ratings on books, so why do they accept it on movies and games?

Both the ESRB and the MPAA are voluntary rating boards. You can make a game/movie and release it without a rating, and it's plenty legal (but difficult to get certified for console releases). It's a much, much better solution than attempting to have the government dictate and enforce regulations.

You can make a game/movie and release it without a rating, and it's plenty legal (but difficult to get certified for console releases).

You mean impossible for console releases. All three North American console makers require an ESRB rating. And no, releasing without a rating on PC isn't an option in some genres that rely on local multiplayer because publishers think there aren't enough home theater PCs to make a market.

'Self-regulation' of this kind is bad precisely because it does work and can't be eliminated overnight through the courts.

But it only worked for this industry. It isn't working as well for the RIAA or the MPAA. Of course, it also isn't working for illegal drugs, alcohol or tobacco, either.

I think it would be interesting to see why it is working here, and here only. I suspect that constant pressure to regulate, and the fact that most games are often sold at box stores that have no problem with censorship is one thing making this system work.

Interesting article, thanks for posting. Definitely one of the better ones out there. I'm glad to see that they put more thought into this than other studies (ie ruling out past experiments that had crap controls, boring games, etc). But a big problem is that the tone of the article is quite sensationalist, and clearly has a solid agenda (comparing the video game industry to the tobacco industry is a bit ridiculous). It is also pretty clear that you can't turn correlational data into causal data (which

Even the most unscrupulous of organizations will self-regulate if it's directly essential to retaining their customers. Besides, with games, unlike other media, it's natural to hold off on access to things until certain conditions have been met: "YOU MUST BE AT LEAST LEVEL 17 TO PURCHASE THIS GAME."

Just because Self regulation of a complex industry such as oil, where failure is disastrous shouldn't be self regulated it doesn't mean self-regulation doesn't work. What is the real cost of failure if part of the self regulation of video games fail. Not much, Mommy sees the game and forbids the kid from playing the game, perhaps nightmares for a day or two. Returns the game and complains to the store owner. And they yell at the clerk who sold him the copy.The game industry doesn't want angry parents all

Parents can learn more about how entertainment media for children are rated here [ftc.gov]. This site describes the different ratings systems, and provides links to the organizations that sponsor them.

If you really think that parenting is the cause or solution to all problems dealing with children and adolescents, you are quite naive. Responsible parents raise bad kids, bad parents raise good kids (sometimes even a few of each!). Kids disobey their parents. Parents have to strike a balance between trusting their kids and being invasive. For example, you can argue "why did that kid have a gun to shoot up the school, where were his parents?!" - when that kid was well behaved and the parents had no reas

Well, the "where were the parents when kids do horrible things" thing comes from this mistaken belief that, somehow, we can prevent anything bad from ever happening to anyone anywhere as well as the belief that if something bad happens it is obviously someone's fault and you can't blame a child or a victim. In the case of children, that leads to the parents. "If the parents had only paid more attention, they could have known and done something..."

Natural human responsibility? You're not a student of history, are you? Everyone's always been blaming everything on someone else. Even the bible toting population can escape it with the myth of the first man Adam blaming eating an apple on the first woman Eve who blamed it on a snake. So... If that's your baseline "natural", then there ya go, nobody takes responsibility "naturally".

Of course, if we're talking evolution, taking responsibility only makes sense if it propagated our species. Doesn't make much sense in a death penalty court case. Doesn't make much sense in telling your lover you screwed around on her/him (since you are now very unlikely to procreate with said lover).

So... what's this "natural" thing you are talking about? Or is that some 1950's sounding buzzword to return us all to the "good ole days"?

If everybody took responsibility for themselves, their children, and their own actions and words, then what's in that for government? The goal is to transfer that natural human responsibility to the business of government, justifying yet even more power and revenue for the elite few. The goal is to have the populace run to government at the first hint of a problem -- NOT to think for themselves and come to a reasonable solution, skipping the middleman entirely.

If someone is old enough to walk into a store and purchase a product, then that person is probably old enough to not be significantly harmed by hearing, seeing, or playing the content. The ratings should exist as a guide to parents, who shouldn't purchase these products for young children. By the time they're teenagers and have their own money and transportation, there are more pressing things to worry about than if they're seeing boobs in a movie, hearing explicit lyrics in a song, or turning enemies into a mass of blood and gore in a video game. Let's worry about keeping them in school, off of drugs, and not pregnant.

...It's entirely possible that if babies played video games in other languages they would learn from the games in a way more closely matching that of interacting with a real person than the do from watching TV.

Yes, and it's also entirely possible that babies playing certain video games in other languages would result in an Army-certified Sniper by the age of 10, able to kill you at 800+ yards, and whisper "goodbye" to you in Russian.

Scary part about some of these games is their realism and tactics mirror reality in many ways.

Army-certified Sniper by the age of 10, able to kill you at 800+ yards, and whisper "goodbye" to you in RussianThat's Hollywood. in real life they never make it past script kiddie or phone pranking your house, your neighbors, your family, your employer, your financial institution and your insurance agent.

I think the argument about babies is dubious, not all learning is created equal, so I agree with you there. On the other hand, I'm pretty sure that if you talked to anyone in the military they could rant forever about the lack of realism in video games.

Of course the kid isn't going to be harmed by sexually explicit stuff. The average kid sees his first female breast within their first day of existence, probably plays "doctor" before he's in school, and has probably kissed someone of the appropriate sex with somewhat sexual intent by the time he's about 10 or 12. I distinctly remember my middle school principle getting on the PA to tell students to stop copping feels the hallways. And a bunch of my high school classmates ended up pregnant years before turning 20. In short, kids are nowhere near as naive as their parents would like them to be.

These legal efforts aren't and have never been about protecting kids. They're about protecting parents from the thought that their little angel will at some point in their life have sex. Kids are rather horrified at the thought that mom & dad would get it on too, but they're legally second-class citizens and can't vote so their opinions don't matter politically.

And a bunch of my high school classmates ended up pregnant years before turning 20. In short, kids are nowhere near as naive as their parents would like them to be.

You just contradicted yourself. It is exactly the naivete of high schoolers that leads them to getting pregnant in the first place.

Granted that draconian rules on keeping kids away from each other rather than teach them how to be responsible can tend to lead to that kind of naivete, but underage pregnancy is still a symptom of the kids being naive so my point still stands.

Actually, a significant number of my pregnant classmates got that way intentionally. For very stupid reasons (e.g. keeping an older boyfriend happy or cementing a marriage that began when he was 18 and she was 16 because she really wanted out of her parents' place), but intentionally.

There was one who didn't though. She was as naive as you describe, and was both pro-life and in no condition to raise a child. She told me later she miscarried, and I didn't entirely take her word on that but also didn't press

Actually, a significant number of my pregnant classmates got that way intentionally.

I'd argue that those girls were also being naive.

But that's still a different sort of naivete to getting pregnant because you don't know that that's a potential consequence of having sex. They were knowledgeable enough to know the likely immediate consequences of their actions, and intelligent enough to intend for them to happen, but not wise enough to know that their methods were unlikely to lead to their real goal. That's not really naivete, but rather foolishness, and failure to compute consequences correctly is a very common human failing, enough so t

How is he acting like that? To put the idea into a more easily understood example:

I had some money in my bank account before I ever had a job (from gifts etc.) Then I got a job, and had a lot more money in my bank account. Would it be acting like I never had money to say that my job puts money in my bank account?

We're not supposed to have a problem with censorship when it's by private industry, because it's only censorship when the government does it. But if the industry is self-censoring because the only alternative is the threat of the government stepping in and doing it (which would presumably be unconstitutional) and that results in a whole range of content not having distribution and titles that do have distribution being modified so that they have less teeth (think of the most mature game versus the most mature movie you can get at the theater or on DVD) . . . and I have to ask "what's the difference?". One is a result directly mandated by the government and the other result is derived through extortion by the government. Worse, the extortion/threat method allows them to accomplish the same thing through a ratings middle-man in a private industry that keeps them from getting their hands dirty at a legal level.

What about nudity and sex? I find it hard to believe that Fallout: New Vegas really required censoring out the sex scenes which were apart of the story was really reasonable. I don't know whether they ever planned to include more, but considering the amount of violence and other adult themes, I think they could have put more in than a cut away.

What about nudity and sex? I find it hard to believe that Fallout: New Vegas really required censoring out the sex scenes which were apart of the story was really reasonable. I don't know whether they ever planned to include more, but considering the amount of violence and other adult themes, I think they could have put more in than a cut away.

No, this is about the threat of government regulation causing private industry regulation to accomplish the exact same thing, without putting the government into any sort of legal mud. You see the results in nearly every title that is developed to avoid an M rating or to stay within an M rating (nobody carries AO rated games). In effect, what we have is far worse than if the government directly censored, because if the government directly censored it, we could go to court over it and hash it out once and fo

I would be a lot happier with the ESRB if they changed their second-highest category to some name other than 'Mature' or anything else with a positive context. Most of the games in this category handle their subject matter in the least mature ways possible, so the name isn't accurate (and yes, I'm aware of how the name is intended to be used; the fact remains that it's not used that way). Worse, by using a word with positive connotations, the ESRB only increases the rating's viability as a marketing tool, w

With the exception of things legally forbidden to children (alcohol and tobacco), kids can get anything they want online. It amazes me that brick-and-mortar retailers bother even trying to enforce "industry standard" self-regulation (then again, compare their sales, and it doesn't look so surprising).

And before someone points out the obvious (but wrong) problem with the above - Visa gift cards. Greatest things ever.

Typically they require a signature from somebody of legal age in whatever jurisdiction. The post office doesn't just leave a box like that sitting on somebody's porch or hand it off to a ten year old. I doubt very much that UPS or FedEx would either. They all have an option for mandatory signature just for such things.

Typically they require a signature from somebody of legal age in whatever jurisdiction.

To what do you refer here? I have never had to sign for a delivery from Amazon (well over 90% of the time, they just leave it on the porch, the delivery guy never even sees me).

If you meant beer or smokes, then okay (in fact, in my state, as an adult I can't legally get alcohol shipped to me). But Games? Music? Movies (even pornos)? Nope. No one cares about, much less bothers to check, the buyer's age.

Why would they, though? They're just fictional media. There's no real-world evidence that I've seen that proves they do anything more than make someone have temporary aggressive thoughts (which typically go away after they are finished with the video game/movie/music).

I have no problem with self-regulation, however, it needs to be simplified. There is one rating system for movies, one for TV, and one for games. Let's make one common scale, and something easy, and then have all the boards work together - I mean, TV shows are like movies. Games are like movies. TV shows are sometimes about movies, and games are sometimes about both. It only makes sense.

I'm saying the "chart" should factor both the sum total of "offensiveness", as well as the high-water mark. I agree whole-heartedly with your premise that a game that's 5/5 in anything should be more closely scrutinized than a game with 5 1's. The reason I propose listing the specific reasons is lifted from the TV rating guides, which tell you WHY a show is rated what it is - that way, if a parent is worried about their kid seeing drug imagery, but is OK with violence, they can make informed decisions based

ESBR ratings already have a content descriptors which provide far more information that a 1-5 scale (does 2/5 for violence mean violence of a more graphic nature that a 1/5 score, or does it mean a higher quantity of the same violence?).

Rather than having to pick a number on a 1-5 violence scale to limit what can be played you choose from a list (note this is alpabetical not orded by violence level - which is debatable anyway is a photorealistic rape scene more or less violent than an animated decapitation

I do like how ESRB does break down and say why it is rated a certain way (as another replier pointed out). However, as many will always say, so much of the responsibility should be on the parent, and the "problem" of kids getting access to these games is almost always the fault of the parents, not the stores.

I have actually had the misfortune of working behind the counter of such a store. I would absolutely not sell a mature rated game to the kids directly, but they simply get their parents (or other adul

In the U.S., the MPAA's rating systems are the most-recognized guide for parents regarding the content of movies, and each rating has been trademarked by MPAA so that they are not used outside of motion pictures.

Hence making a new one, and convincing all the agencies to switch to it (possibly with some help from government, as a compromise - use a rating scale that is consistent and makes sense, and we won't regulate you.

Compare that to movies (Rated PG-13, no reasons given) or worse, music (explicit or not), and you'll see that ESRB ratings give far more info to parents/buyers to decide on if the game is a good idea before purchase. (Should I let my kid play World of Goo? oh, E, comic mischief

I worked at Suncoast several years ago and we were explicitly told not to enforce age restrictions on movies (discretion allowed on the "adult" movies, but still no carding). Anyone with the cash was allowed to buy R or Unrated movies. Meanwhile, the Gamestop next door was turning away kids trying to buy Grand Theft Auto. Often parents would come in, ask why their kid couldn't buy it, then buy it for them anyway.

I hang out with my 8 yr old cousin sometimes. He roughly says,"I want to play a mature game, all the cool kids play games designed for older kids above their age." He then says,"I want gore and language in my games" If there wasn't a system in place that rated gore and language, he probably wouldn't care. But since there is a system in place, he wants this stuff because it is what older and "cool kids" get.

But it still appears to be useless and based on the assumption that fictional media somehow changes people. They should have to have real-world evidence that that is true before enacting any sort of "regulations," in my opinion.